


Blood and Bones

by GalaxyBrownies



Category: Undertale
Genre: Chara Needs a Hug, Cutting, Depression, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Frans - Freeform, Genocide Run, Hurt/Comfort, Papara, Post pacifist, Reader Is Chara, Save Asriel, Save Chara, Self Harm, Seriously don’t read if cutting triggers you, chara regret, post genocide pacifist, reader - Freeform, the frans is kinda background though, vent - Freeform, vent fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-19
Updated: 2018-02-19
Packaged: 2019-03-21 03:12:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,328
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13731924
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GalaxyBrownies/pseuds/GalaxyBrownies
Summary: Chara has mental issues. Papyrus is there to help.





	Blood and Bones

**Author's Note:**

> This is a vent fic, not canon to my main fic, The Story of UNDERTALE. Please don’t read if you are triggered by self harm or depression, thanks!
> 
>  
> 
> My Tumblr

You drag the razor across your wrist, hissing at the pain it brings you. _Good_. You deserved this. You deserved _so much more_ than this. 

Blood wells up at the fresh cut, and you wipe it away with a piece of toilet paper, immediately tossing it into the toilet next to you. You sit against the wall, back pressing almost painfully against the surface, doorstop digging into your spine. You can’t bring yourself to move. Every scrap of pain that you suffer is small, so small, compared to the pain you caused so many others.

You repeat this process three more times, and once more on your upper left thigh, before setting the razor down. You wash it carefully under cold water before placing in back in your cupboard. You didn’t want to get an infection. Despite the harm you caused yourself, you didn’t want to risk death. 

You were so pathetic. It’s not like you haven’t killed yourself before. Buttercups and yellow and acrid tastes and blood and death fill your mind, and you have to take a second, slouched over the counter, breathing heavily. _No_. You will _not_ have a panic attack. You refuse.

You steady your breath, taking a second to watch your blood drip into the sink, proof of your pain. You smile. You were getting what you deserved, what no one else could give you. No one else remembered. Except Frisk, and Asriel. Sans _knows_ about what happened, but you don’t think he remembers, not the same way you three do. You felt _so alone_. 

You run your wounds under cold water, clenching your fists and eyes at the sharp pain it brings. You hold it under until the blood stops flowing, the water at the bottom runs clear, and the pain is numbed. 

You flush the toilet, filled with the bloody evidence of your crime, watching it disappear down the drain. No one would know. You wouldn’t let them. Sighing, you yank your green sweater sleeve down, covering the hastily made cuts, unlock the bathroom, and step out. That was refreshing.

 

____

 

“Beach day!!” Frisk yells as she barrels out of her room, floaties and all. Why did she even wear those? She was nineteen years old, and knew fully well how to swim. You suppose she just likes the look of them. You could relate. You didn’t _need_ to cut, but the way the wounds looked calmed you. Grounded you. You were _here_ , you were _now_. You weren’t leaving any time soon.

“Beach day?” You mumble out, full of dread. You had _just_ made new cuts. This couldn’t come at a worse time. Salt water in your wounds, coupled with the fact that everyone would almost certainly see the lines, both scars and open, criss crossing your arms and legs. No. You couldn’t go to the beach. 

“Yeah, Chara! Aren’t you excited?”

“Eh,” you mutter, if only slightly untruthfully. You liked the beach, but your fear of anyone seeing your self harm outweighed your want to get out of the house.

“Well _I’m_ going!” She tugs Asriel to her side. “And so is he!”

Asriel gives a lazy thumbs up, standing there in his green and yellow floral swimming trunks. You don’t know how he could stand the reminder of those flowers after what had happened to him.

You felt like you were on another planet. Your bathroom was your world, and now you were on Mars. Apparently Mars was a bubbly sunshine planet where no one hurt themselves and nothing was ever sad, but still.

“Who else is going?” You rub tired eyes with your sweater sleeve, ignoring the harsh pain the scratchy fabric brings to your wrist. You would survive. You had lived through worse.

“Everyone!” Frisk exclaims, throwing her hands up. “They’re in the living room now!” She grabs you and tugs you through the door despite your frantic protests. She was grabbing the _wrong arm_.

She doesn’t notice, thankfully, but you are tossed into the crowded living room nonetheless. The room is already filled with chatter, mostly centered around Papyrus. What was up with him?

“ARGH! THAT ANNOYING DOG TORE A HOLE IN MY SWIMSUIT!” He screams, obviously deeply upset. You frown. You didn’t like seeing him sad, even if you have killed him before. You never liked hurting Papyrus. To be truthful, you never liked hurting _anyone_. You don’t know why you had done it. It was like something else was pulling the strings, forcing you to move. Something beyond your comprehension. You blamed yourself anyway.

“it’s okay, pap. we’ll just go another time,” his lazy brother drawls. You narrow your eyes. His attempt to escape the beach trip was too obvious. Frisk wouldn’t let him stay, you knew. 

“No way, Sans!” She shouts, right on cue. “You promised you’d come this time!”

“i didn’t _promise_ ,” he grumbles. Sans and his promises. It was rare for him to ever make one, so you doubt he’d done so for something as trivial as a beach trip. Frisk pouts. “ _fine_ ,” He exaggeratedly huffs, but he’s still smiling.

“SO I HAVE TO STAY HOME BY MYSELF?” The poor skeleton sounds incredibly distraught. You recognize your chance to stay home.

“I’ll stay with you!” You exclaim, probably a bit too quickly. You just needed to stay out of the water and stay fully clothed. Maybe you could even go back to your bathroom for a while.

Papyrus’s eyes light up. “REALLY?” You nod emphatically. You did enjoy the skeleton’s company, it wasn’t _all_ just a cover. You hoped that your guilt didn’t get the better of you.

Sans eyes you, slightly suspicious, but lets it slide. You’d been alive again for a couple of years now, he had more than enough evidence that you wouldn’t hurt anyone. 

“Are you sure you want to stay home, my child?” Your mother asks, concerned. You never went to the beach with your family, the trips always came at the worst possible times, with no advance notice. You nod once again, and she reluctantly gathers everyone in the room to shove them out the door. Getting the whole group to go anywhere was extremely difficult, you pitied her.

“I’ll get you a seashell!” Undyne crows, messing up your hair as you pout theatrically. You had to put on a show.

“Thanks, Undyne,” you say, and she and Alphys wave you goodbye. Your mother kisses you on the top of your head, and with the click of a closing door, everyone is gone.

Everyone except you and Papyrus.

God, _Papyrus_. You had hurt him so many times. You _can’t_ run to the bathroom, not now, not now.

He looks at you, confused by your silence and looking even slightly worried by the dark look in your eyes.

The guilt washes over you in waves, now. You were alone with _Papyrus_. You don’t think you’ve been alone with him at all in all the time you’ve been brought back to life. 

Your wrists itch.

Papyrus looks down at you, opening his mouth to say something, but you dash out of the room, making a beeline for the bathroom. You can’t be alone with him in there right now. You can’t handle it.

“Sorry! Gotta go!” You say, swinging into the bathroom and quickly closing the door. He was probably so confused. 

You felt like a jerk.

_Idiot._

_Murderer._

_Stupid._

_Dirty. Brother. Killer._

Almost robotically, you open your medicine cabinet door, pulling out the razor. With the same jerky movements, you bring the sharp edge to your wrist and press down, slicing at your scarred skin.

_One for every reset, pulling Papyrus back Underground._

_Two for the ending where he’s left alone, ruler of an empty world._

_Three for killing his best friend._

_Four for slicing his head off, the only one to die in the ruined timeline._

_Dirty. Brother. Killer._ You punctuate each word with a cut.

_Five for betraying him at his most vulnerable. He had just wanted a hug, why couldn’t you just do that?_

_Six for crushing his skull under your pitiless foot._

_Seven for pretending none of it had ever happened._

The blood is pouring down in rivulets now, staining the white tile below you. Too much, too much! You had cut too deep, and now you were in danger. You shouldn’t have left yourself alone with him, you had known that your conscience wouldn’t leave you alone!

You felt kind of dizzy, kind of nauseous. You wouldn’t die, that much was true, but you feared that you might need stitches. And stitches meant that your parents would find out at the very least, if not everyone. _No, no!_

“HUMAN?” You hear Papyrus’s voice from outside the bathroom. _It’s Chara_ , you want to correct him, but you might throw up if you open your mouth. “HUMAN? ARE YOU ALRIGHT?”

God, you wished you could respond, tell him to go away, that you didn’t need any help with anything. But looking at the floor, at the puddle of blood quickly gathering there, you knew it wasn’t true. You needed help. You just wish that it wasn’t Papyrus that had to deal with this. He was too innocent, too sweet. He wouldn’t understand. Would he? 

“HUMAN! I’M COMING IN!” He says, and despite your previous thought, you really don’t want him in here, but it’s too late, you hadn’t locked the door and he was pushing it open and

“CHARA!” He stands in the entryway, eyes wide. 

You wish he hadn’t found out like this. It would’ve gone over much better if he had simply caught a peek of a scar, or better yet, if he hadn’t found out at all. But here you were, lying in a puddle of your own blood, and he was watching.

“OH, DEAR,” he says, scooping you up. You can see the worry spelled clearly on his face. Your vision is fading in and out. Maybe you had lost more blood than you had originally thought. “DO NOT WORRY, HUMAN! I WILL PATCH YOU RIGHT UP!” You wonder why he’s being so calm about this. Has he seen this before?

“Pap… Papyrus? D-don… don’t…” but whatever you were trying to say is shushed as he presses you close to his chest, sending green healing magic through you as he walks towards the living room. You were such a moron. Why had you thought that you could get away with this? You couldn’t do anything right, not even this. You were such a _burden._

He doesn’t say anything more, sitting on the couch and cradling you close, sending as much magic through you as he can. If you weren’t so hurt, you’d be blushing right now. This was a very close position to be in. You supposed that your dislike of touch would have to be disregarded for the moment, if Papyrus had ever even set that off. You can’t remember a time when you had flinched away from him. It was like your body subconsciously knew and understood how nice he was. You don’t think he could hurt a fly.

Your breathing steadies after a moment, and you focus on the calm rise and fall of your chest.

In, out. 

In, out.

In, out.

In…

“Would you allow me to see your arm?” Papyrus asks, in a gentler voice than you knew he was capable of. You nod, holding out your clean arm. He gently rolls the sleeve up, only to give you the most incredulous look. “THE HURT ONE,” he clarifies, back to his regular tone.

With a sigh, you give him hold of your cut arm. He pushes up your sleeve, already stained with your blood, and sucks a quick puff of air through his teeth at what he sees.

“CHARA…” he simply states, beyond words. You bow your head in shame. You had never wanted anyone to find out about this. You could have had a nice day with Papyrus, but you ruined it, just like you ruined your family, and just like you ruined everything else. You feel like crying. You won’t cry. 

A small strangled noise erupts from your throat despite your efforts, a great shuddering sob racking across your chest. You curl in on yourself as tears begin to fall despite your inhibitions.

Papyrus pulls you even closer, enveloping you in a somehow warm hug. Skeleton hugs: an unsolved enigma. You tuck your head into his shoulder, letting the sobbing wrack your body. He simply placed a comforting hand on your back and rubs soothingly. 

You wonder why he’s so calm about all this. Did he think this was an accident?

“W-WHY?” He asks you, startling you out of your thoughts. You try to pass off your injuries with a laugh.

“O-oh, you know me, Pap! Always tripping and falling… on razors…” What an incredibly pathetic lie. You don’t think even a moldsmal would believe that. 

“PLEASE DO NOT LIE TO ME,” he says, sympathetic eyes meeting yours. You can feel your face crumple. You don’t think you’ve tripped and fallen _once_ while you lived here. Why had you thought that that might work?

“I… I-” You want to continue, you really do, but at the brink of your admission of truth, a dam breaks somewhere inside of you, and every tear, every pain, every scream into nothingness breaks out at once. God, you didn’t want to _do this_ right now! You really needed to stop! No one could know, no one _should_ know what you were. Because despite your nagging and teasing, suggesting the opposite, deep down you were a Dirty. Fucking. Crybaby.

Your silent tears are no more, giving way to a wailing, shaking cry that shakes you down to your core, threatens to expose the truth. You were a killer. A murderer. A destroyer. An eraser of worlds. And you had enjoyed it.

You clutch Papyrus with your life, most likely squeezing too tightly, but you didn’t particularly care as you sobbed into his shirt. Great, there’s _another_ thing you ruined, what with your blood and tears and everything. He doesn’t say anything, just continues to rub your back soothingly. Papyrus shouldn’t have to deal with this, this mess that you’ve become at the slightest word.

His hand reaches up to gently stroke your hair, a technique that he shouldn’t have known. Hair petting _always_ calms you down, but no one knew that except you… so why was he doing it?

You can’t believe that you could ever hurt anything this precious, this _important_. You had called him forgettable back then, but now you knew the truth. He could never be anything like that. 

You  
Would  
Never  
Forget

What you did would haunt you for your entire life, you knew. Or what was left of it, anyway. 

Still, getting your hair stroked _was_ pretty nice. Slowly but surely, you were eased back down from the edge of hysterics, breathing once again slowed. You sit up, wiping at your eyes with a sweatered hand. That had felt nice. You still felt like shit for crying, and burdening Papyrus, but the physical release had been uplifting.

At least your lungs weren’t doing that weird thing where they couldn’t take in enough air, and you felt like the big bad wolf, all huffing and puffing. That would have been truly humiliating.

“I’m s-sorry,” you say, voice still thick from crying. “I shouldn’t burden you with this. I’ll go.” You attempt to remove yourself from your spot on Papyrus’s lap, but are unable to remove yourself from his iron grip. “P-Papyrus?”

“We need to talk about this,” he says, in that uncharacteristically small voice again. You want to hurt yourself again for making him like this. He was _Papyrus_. He wasn’t supposed to sound like he was two steps away from crying like you had, like the weight of the world was on his shoulders. 

“I-I’ll talk,” you promise, “but first, can I clean up my mess? I wouldn’t like it if someone came home and saw it…” Surprised at your compliance, Papyrus nods, jaw clenched. He abruptly stands up, still holding you, and you jolt and teeter back in surprise. “Can you set me down?” You ask, and Papyrus does so, embarrassed look on his face. 

You take a deep breath, letting it out slowly, as you gather yourself. Your heart was pounding in your throat. You were caught. You were caught, and now you had to pay the consequences. If that meant Papyrus knew, then Papyrus knew. If that meant that he told everyone, then he told everyone. 

You walk back into the bathroom, bracing yourself for the grisly sight. It’s just as bad as you anticipate- pools of blood running through the grout on the floor. Some of the shallower puddles are already drying into a brownish sludge. Maybe you can sneak away your razor while you clean the blood?

Before you can do anything, Papyrus bends down and snatches up the razor. You sigh. You knew it had been too much to hope that you could sneak it out of his view and back into hiding.

You stand there, waiting for him to leave so that you can start cleaning. He doesn’t go.

“Papyrus? Are you gonna go so I can clean?”

“WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT? I’M HELPING,” he declares. Who are you to argue with that? You are glad to hear his voice back at its usual tone, at least.

“Fine,” you admit defeat, “then… go get some paper towels… like the whole roll… and bleach. Lots of bleach.” He nods in affirmation, but then glances down at the razor in his hand. You pause, unsure of what to say.

Luckily, Papyrus takes care of it for you, placing it on the ground, then calling up his magic to impale it with a bone. He does this several times until it’s a twisted, useless scrap of metal. You actually feel a twinge of sadness. That had been your best friend for several years. You had even taken special measures to keep it sharp, keep it _useful_. Not that it mattered now that it was a hunk of smoking metal. 

He picks up the destroyed razor and walks to the kitchen, most likely to throw it away and grab the cleaning supplies. You stand there for a second, taking in everything that has happened. Your wrists ache. The pain is lessened, due to the healing magic, but they still hurt. You hope your relationship with Papyrus isn’t ruined forever. That’s probably your top worry. You would never forgive yourself if he wanted nothing to do with you after this. Not that you would blame him.

You wouldn’t want anything to do with you either.

He comes back after an undetermined amount of time, lugging cleaning supplies in tow. You have to stop him when he takes out the bleach and ammonia together, and inform him of the poisonous gases that would be created if you cleaned with both. He hurriedly puts the ammonia away, and you get to work. 

First was sopping up the puddles of blood with the paper towels. At glancing over to Papyrus, he actually looks moderately sick at the gory visuals, and you wince in sympathy. He’s probably never seen this much blood in his whole life. Still, he really is acting calm for the situation. Too calm. You ask him why.

“SANS,” he says without a moment’s hesitation, but doesn’t elaborate. You don’t need him to. _Stars_ , that was probably your fault _too_. If Sans had hurt himself (or if he still was) the only reason you could think of for him doing it would be time fuckery. That left you or Asriel or Frisk as the possible culprits, but you doubted it was the others. After all, Asriel had been Flowey at the time, and Flowey was gone now, and Sans was _dating_ Frisk. You, however, were just you. A time-traveling, murderous freak.

The room is silent until the mess is cleaned and bleached, and you can no longer smell the coppery stench of blood in the room. Good riddance.

You sit back on your heels, taking a few deep breaths of the sterile air. The room is clean, but your conscience is not. You still have to talk to Papyrus. You had promised.

You allow Papyrus to lead you back to the living room after far too much time passes in the room that was once your world. You curl up on his lap, catatonic for a few minutes, before he finally prompts you to speak.

“I guess… I guess I don’t really like myself, all that much,” you admit, the first of many admissions. You knew that you didn’t have to, but you planned to tell him everything. You wouldn’t be able to live with yourself if you let him continue his friendship with you unknowing of what you had done. There was also the fact that Papyrus was much more… mild than some of your friends. You would never tell someone like Undyne, she would never forgive you.

“I don’t really know where to start,” you laugh. “It’s a long story.” But you start, right where stories should. At the beginning.

You tell him about why you fell, how you hadn’t _really_ fallen. You had jumped. You had been abused on the Surface, so you ran away. That much was easy to confess.

It was still fairly easy to confess everything leading up to and including the Flower Incident. That would _never_ make you feel guilty. Even though Papyrus frowns heavily at your story, you think he understands. He pulls you a little closer, but doesn’t say anything.

You pause in your story, giving time for him to process what you have said so far. You sit up a little in his lap, pressing your cheek against his chest in some simile of a hug. You can hear the magic in his SOUL humming, a constant drone that is different from what you are used to, and yet at the same time so strikingly familiar. It’s baffling how much the sound just feels like _Papyrus_. Probably because it is, in its own way.

You take a breath and explain how you were brought back into consciousness when Frisk fell. Frisk had died, if only temporarily, allowing what was left of your SOUL to rush in and fill the gaps. You had been good, a narrator, just helping Frisk on her journey. Frisk had killed a couple monsters here and there in self defense, not really maliciously. Flowey had killed Asgore, and taken the human SOULs.

And when you reach the end of what had been Frisk’s first run, Papyrus interrupts you for the first time.

“WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT? NONE OF THAT EVER HAPPENED!” You smile sadly at the skeleton, and continue.

You explain Frisk’s time travel ability, how her determination allowed her to unravel time itself, make it clay for her to shape any way she wished. You explain the careful tinkering, the games you nudged her to play with the timelines. You explain the runs, good and bad. Papyrus clenches his hug tighter around you, and you think he might be shaking. If he hated you after this, you wouldn’t blame him. In fact, you expected it.

You pause, filled with dread at what you were about to tell him. You take a long breath, letting it out slowly. You sit up from your hug, and look him straight in the eye, or what passes for an eye with skeletons. The worst run. The worst timeline. You take both gloved hands in yours and tell him about the Genocide Run. The time you and Frisk (let’s be honest here, just you) killed everyone. Anyone you could get your greedy, EXP hungry, dusty hands on.

You had murdered everyone.

Even Papyrus.

_God._

Papyrus is full on trembling now, as you explain how he crumbled to dust, and you want to stop, your brain is _screaming_ at you to stop, but to your horror, your mouth keeps moving, continuing to spill out detail after detail after detail. You think your eyes prick with tears again as you continue to describe his death, how it felt to kill him, but you make no move to wipe them away when they begin to trickle down your cheeks.

Maybe if you are lucky, Papyrus will hate you enough to tell everyone what you did, how _disgusting_ you are, and they’ll all abandon you and you can go and kill yourself like you deserve.

You’re still holding his hands, which, miraculously, aren’t pulling away, desperately as you describe the crunch of his skull underneath your foot, the way his dust blew away in the cold, cold wind. You continue to stare him straight in the eye as you tell him how his brother collected his scarf and wore it to battle, like a knight in shining armor.

You actually feel a sense of relief when this part of the story is over, as if describing the slaughter of his best friend to him should be any easier, but it _is._

You tell him how Undyne never gave up, even when she was cut down. You describe her fight in full detail, and how she melted away in her final breaths. Determination was a hell of a drug.

You describe the evacuation of Hotland, how everyone had fled in terror of your rampage, how easily you cut down Mettaton, and moved on to New Home.

You described your old home to him, not that he didn’t already know what it looked like. 

You tell him about Sans, and his final stand against you. You tell him that the one thing that kept Sans going was the thought of Papyrus. You look down at your hands when you describe just _how much_ Papyrus means to Sans, and you think Papyrus is crying now, really truly crying.

You tell him how often Sans killed you, how often you had to rewind time itself to have another go at him. You tell him that when you finally manage to get a hit on him, his last words had been some hallucinatory conversation with none other than Papyrus himself. You could quote his own brother’s dying words to him.

“‘Papyrus, do you want anything?’” You quote, and something in Papyrus falters. Why were you telling him all this? He never asked for this, if he had had a choice, he would be at the _beach_ right now! You don’t think you can look at him anymore, but you don’t want to hug him either. You are terrified that he’ll push you away, run away while screaming at you like the demon you are. You had absolutely no excuse for your actions. None at all. 

The hilarity of the situation hits you. Everyone is messing around, playing in the sand, tanning, while you almost just cut yourself to death and are now emotionally traumatizing Papyrus. He didn’t need this.

You still had a story to tell.

You tell him about how after you killed his brother, killed _Sans_ , you had hit a wall. Why were you even doing this? Why bother killing everyone? Sans had been right, it would accomplish nothing except to get rid of everything, and despite common belief, that was _not_ something that you had wanted.

You had RESET the timeline, back to the golden flowers. Everything came back to these fucking things. You had awoken Frisk from whatever sleep she had fallen into during the Genocide, and gave her back her body. You sat in the background as she played Pacifist, and set everyone free. But…

She saved Asriel. And somehow, you. You weren’t sure how. You suspected that was something that only Frisk knew. You look back up at Papyrus’s face, a mix of fear and pride and you aren’t sure which one is worse.

“That’s… that’s it,” you end lamely. Papyrus takes a couple seconds to formulate his response, but when he does respond, it’s in that low, serious voice again.

“Well, I can’t say that what you did was _good_ ,” he begins, and it’s all you can do to stop yourself from laughing. He gives you a look but continues, voice switching back to normal again, “BUT YOU CHANGED! JUST LIKE I SAID YOU COULD! YOU STOPPED YOURSELF FROM DOING A VIOLENCE TO THE KING AND YOU CAME BACK!” You… hadn’t looked at it that way before.

“But I did all those terrible things… I deserve much worse than this.”

“NUH UH! IF YOU HADN’T RESET, EVERYTHING WOULD’VE DISAPPEARED, YOU SAID SO YOURSELF! YOU SAVED EVERYONE!” And this time, you _do_ laugh, hands barely staying where they are in Papyrus’s grasp. 

“But what I did to you…”

“WHATEVER! I CAN’T EVEN REMEMBER IT! AND IF YOU FEEL BAD NOW, SURELY THAT MEANS THAT YOU’VE CHANGED! YOU HAVE TO HAVE CHANGED!” Well, you supposed that was true enough.

“Sans hates me,” you state glumly, and Papyrus frowns.

“WELL THEN I’LL JUST HAVE TO HAVE A TALK WITH MY BROTHER, WON’T I?” His confidence in you is _astounding_. When you think about it, Papyrus really was the only person who ever believed in you. Even before he knew what you did, he still knew that you had done _something_ , but he always rooted for you anyway, and convinced the others to give you a chance. “CHARA. I FORGIVE YOU,” He says, and it wipes every worry away, like fresh water over stone, wiping away every facade, every mask, until only you and him remain.

You look at Papyrus, as if seeing him clearly for the first time. You had known that Papyrus was forgiving, but it seemed that his forgiveness truly knew no bounds. You had described crushing his skull _in detail_ , and he brushed it off like you had given him the wrong type of tea or something. Past-you would have called it idiocy. Present-you thought it was brave. And oddly charming, honestly.

You jerk into a hug, squeezing him as tightly as you can. He _forgave_ you. You would’ve thought it impossible. You knew for a fact that no one else would react this way. It was the best part of Papyrus. He was willing to look past anyone’s past, look at who they are _now_.

“You are the only person who’s ever believed in me,” you whisper next to his skull, and you know the truth in your words. Asriel and Frisk _rooted_ for you, yes, but the only person who _believed_ in you was Papyrus. It had always been Papyrus.

You move back in front of him, looking him right in the face. He looked so _calm_ , like he had known exactly how everything would play out. Well, maybe you could try and surprise him, then.

You kiss him on the cheekbone, just a quick peck. It’s enough to cause a bright orange blush to cascade across his face, and you giggle.

“Orange?” You say, giggles breaking up the word.

“Y-YES? SOMETHING WRONG WITH ORANGE??” He sweats nervously.

“No, silly,” you respond, moving off his lap to sit by his side. “It’s nice.” You hold one of his hands, fingers interlaced with his own, and breath heavily. All your faults, all your flaws were laid out, bare, for Papyrus to see and analyze. And he didn’t care about any of them. You knew that your issues with self harm weren’t over, but now you had a foothold, and someone to fall back on.

You think you might like to stay with Papyrus, if you could. You think about Frisk and Sans. Frisk had told you about their codependency, their relationship was built off of many sleepless nights, talking fervently with each other about _that_ run, the worst timeline. Maybe you could be something like that with Papyrus. Not now, of course. Now was just the beginning.

 

You had time.

**Author's Note:**

> My Tumblr


End file.
